Posts

Showing posts from 2014

$100k for a University Degree?

Image
Yes you read the title correct. In time to come, our children may have to fork out over a $100,000 just to get a piece of paper that grants them an interview for an entry level job. Well, that is not the problem. The real problem is you, the parent, is going to pay for it! So how can a university degree cost so much? Let's see the following breakdown. For illustrative purposes, we shall use a NUS (National University of Singapore) Business degree for a new-born baby girl as example. Here is the current tuition fees charged by NUS: According to NUS's tuition fee schedule, a Business degree costs $9,250 per annum.

Key CPF/HDB changes to help retirement

During yesterday's National Day Rally,  PM Lee highlighted a few key changes to the existing CPF system. 1)   CPF members reaching 65 will be   allowed to withdraw a lump sum from their Minimum Sum savings   if they need. There will be a limit, perhaps 20%, to ensure that there is still sufficient savings left for their later years. 2)  The Government will be launching the   Silver Support scheme   to give lower-income Singaporeans with little or no CPF savings an annual bonus from the Government. Details to be announced. 3)  CPF minimum sum scheme will be raised to   $161,000   from the current $155,000 on 1 July next year. 4)  Minimum sum scheme is here to stay. However beyond the increase next year, PM Lee sees no need for further major increase. 5)  An advisory panel set up by the Ministry of Manpower will study a range of retirement issues such as how the Minimum Sum should be adjusted to provide adequate...

The ‘Hot Money‘ Illusion

Last year, the Dow Jones Industrial Average hit a record high of 16,588, totally overshadowing the previous high of 14,000 in 2007 (pre-financial crisis). Does it mean that the US economy is out of the woods? US Markets Hardly so. As we all know, the Federal Reserves has been printing more the US$3.5 trillion of fresh money over the last 5 years to try to revive their struggling economy through their 3 tranches of Quantitative Easing (or ‘QE’ in short) programmes. Also, Federal Reserve has set its interest rates to almost zero, allowing institutions to borrow more and cheaply, in a hope that more spending would spur the economy. As such, there are lots of ‘hot money’ floating around, waiting to be deployed. And it is no surprise that most of this ‘hot money’ are in the hands of banks.